Wildlife Blog

Baby Flamingo at SeaWorld Orlando

Walker is a four-week-old Caribbean flamingo at SeaWorld Orlando. He eats fish, krill, hard boiled eggs, and cereal. When he matures, he’ll also eat a special formula made just for flamingos. At three years, he’ll develop the characteristic bright pink plumage. The coloring results from eating carotenoid pigments found in a variety of plant and animal life.

@astrohater, my understanding is no, they wouldn’t turn pink if they didn’t ingest the pigments from their diets. However, I think if they didn’t receive proper nutrition, they might not live long enough to test the theory.